Stalked and Abused for being a Noob..

Last night I was shopping and minding my own business (I thought I was the only one there) and was asked why I was there and did I not have a RL and blah blah blah... then she tp'd out before I had a chance to even look at her profile! why do people do this? what is the point? and what do you do about it?? this made me feel a bit low, probably the point really but still it makes me mad 'cos IRL you'd just smack em in the face... which is why they feel secure about doing it in SL....I guess.. sorry for the rant, it just pi@#ed me off and I wondered how you handle these things and if there are ways to stop them doing it again?

Hi Onagh and welcome to Second Life!

The first rule of Fight Club is:

A thick skin is absolutely necessary here. Sometimes it takes a little time to grow, but it'll come. Don't let the bastards get you down. Ignore them, go about your own way, and enjoy Second Life. They're the unhappy ones, not you.

Welcome to SL!

That was their only goal.

Just ignore people like that and go back to having fun.

Smacking someone in the face in RL will usually net you a return smack or possibly a visit from the authorities, so I'd be careful. She said you had no RL as she was in SL herself? lol. What you do is Point and Laugh at her and move on.

You'll run across those morons once in awhile no matter where go. Ignore it and continue about your business. On a good note, welcome to the forums, theres some great people here!

/me points and laughs at Brenda.

See how it works?

can you point and laugh at the same time in SL?

I think the main way to deal with it is to look more closely at one little bit of what she said to you:

Rather ironic, considering where she was at the exact moment she said that to you, and what she was doing, don't you think?

/me points and laughs at Oryx

/me excuse me excuse me...

What's RL?

Far more annoying things are likely to happen in SL.

For example, I just went to a sandbox, seeing what's up with successive sits.

Some object nearby has changed it's name to my name, and it endlessly putting out text looking like I said it, which includes the charming phrase "SLURP HIS BUTT!".

I've seen this stuff so much I hardly even notice it.

They've actually come up with something new this time, some kind of giant flickering thing, rendering the sandbox useless untill a Linden staff member disposes of it or it gets returned in the normal sandbox clearing.

Some people were jackasses in their momma's wombs; they will be jackasses all their lives; everyone that knows them will think of them as jackasses all their lives, and when they die, people will breath a sigh of relief and try to hide the smiles on their faces. Some of us just get all the bad genes, I guess.

I suspect that many instances of bad behavior in SL have to do with the bad guy being extremely drunk, or having spent far too many hours at the computer, without proper food or rest.

You think that's bad? Wait 'til you begin to buy some of the stuff they're selling out there. Then you'll really be pissed.

Press ctrl-h to bring up your local chat history. Then you can look up their profile. But remember! It's a dish best served cold...

Some people have nothing better to do with their SL than make others feel small... I'm a year into SL and I still get crap..

Welcome to SL. ; ) Look me up if you need help advice, or just chat. I welcome new people and enjoy meeting them and trying to get them to stay. ; )

Maybe he is talking about people selling freebie stuff? Be careful there, yes.

Sadly there are jackasses all over who have nothing better to do that rain on others' parades.. Warning- you will find some here as well- don't worry- we put out Troll Motels.. they look funny as hell wiggling on their butts cause their so stuck

Welcome to SL - Not everyone sucks or has delusions of grandeur -

Griefers (as they're called) get their pleasure out of annoying you. And I get my pleasure by annoying them by doing nothing and just ignoring them. Good time to make a cup of coffee, sit down and watch their fruitless attempts, and they eventually get bored and move on.

At first I hated it, now I sit back and laugh at them.

Also, if you have the latest client bring up the chat history (Ctrl-h) and click on the person's name and their profile will be displayed. I like that feature

For the kind welcome and also for the words of wisdom, I did pick up on the irony of her being in SL giving me grief for being there too but I just couldn't really get my head around the whole point of doing it.. talk about small things! She cant have had much satisfaction from the whole episode as I was a bit slow to realise that she was even being rude! so she was gone before I could react..
From what you are all saying there's worse to come so I will keep my armour on!! you've all been so kind here to this noob and I look forward to meeting some of you at some stage!
I'm in the process of learning about land buying at the moment, I've just gone premium and am renting in a LOVELY region and have been a bit spoiled by it I think because everytime I go and look at land for sale it's awful!!
Its gotta be cheaper to buy than renting surely.. its finding the nice places that seem hard..
any ideas? much appreciated.. I am off to ctrl H..

Doh! I'm guessing you need to do it straight away.. *sigh*

I got taught early in life that "Sticks and stones can break your bones but words can never hurt you".

My tutor forgot to add on "unless you allow them to".

And if you are sensitive, the muting button in sl is wonderful. You don't get stuff you have muted quoted by others (as is the case with the "ignore" facility in the forums) and the person you have muted doesn't even know you have muted them unless you tell them. So they waste THEIR time, not yours. And, if you like, after they have gone you can switch on the option to look at what they said, to see how frustrated they got by not getting a response. Which usually teaches you that ignoring them would have been the sensible thing to do in the first place!

Pep (*blushes* and admits to enjoying sending away verbal griefers with tails between their legs because he knows longer words than they do)

Seems like she was talking to herself, she can't have much of life herself
There are a lot of smartasses in SL.... Ignore them ,and find other nicer people to talk to. Most of us are actually easy to talk to.

Uuuummm...i think is something from a horror film or something.

Hi, Onaugh! Welcome to Second Life and to the Forums.

As everyone has already said, there are jerks to be found everywhere. Even in Second Life. Maybe *especially* in Second Life, because the consequences of jerkhood are so much less than in RL.

But there are wonderful people too...a lot of them hang out on these forums. There is an in-world group you can join, too. IM Chris Norse or Brenda Connolly or Garrett Laramide and ask for an invitation to "The Forum Cartel".

Fair warning, though: we are a chatty bunch. Just take a look at the 25,000-plus post thread "Just Ignore and Let This One Die" if you don't believe me. We talk a lot in world too.

I've occasionally come across idiots in SL, the best thing is to just move on and dismiss them as silly people not worth thinking about. The vast majority of people in SL are nice, or at least, acceptable.

Hi, Onagh, from another noob. I'm glad you found support and good advice here and were able to shake it off.

I've been in similar situations in which I was painfully to slow to realize the person was simply try to get some sort of reaction from me. I err on being polite, so one episode looked like a comedy routine, with the griefer doing the griefer thing repeatedly and each time I would apologize (the details are too stupid for anyone to care) and say "thanks, but no". In the end, I was weirdly polite and stupid and he was weirdly rude and stupid, so I guess I win.

As for worse to come, I think it in part depends on your response. Had you realized this person was being a jerk right away, you would have stopped her early and it wouldn't have been so bad. So next time may not be either because you know more of what is going on. I'd also recommend the NCI class on dealing with griefers. I found it very interesting and helpful

I've found some very kind, friendly, and helpful people in SL. I'm sure you will find the same.